271. Well, millions of people have left their countries and are still doing so throughout

history. It was not and is not easy for them, any more than it would be for an American. If your government reaches a point where it no longer represents your core beliefs and you, by paying taxes, are supporting invasions and torture etc, you do have a decision to make. You can either turn a blind eye and try to focus on the good your country does, leave, or stay and try to change things.

I like option 3. Nothing changes when all the good people leave. The Catholic Church has more members world wide than this country. It has huge power to do good in the world, and like this country, many of its members have done a great deal of good. And like any large grouping of people, there are bad people who make bad decisions. Some of them in positions of power, just like this country.

I am a Liberal eg, because of my Catholic upbringing. I suppose the same is true of the Kennedys, Kerry and many other Democratic leaders. I learned that we are supposed to look out for the 'least among us' as the actual founder of the Church preached. I learned how he cured the sick, and didn't send them a bill, gave to the poor and didn't tell them to 'pull themselves up by their bootstraps', how he warned the rich that it would be 'more difficult for a rich man to enter heaven than for a camel to go through the eye of a needle'. I made myself a promise that if I ever got rich, I would try to make sure I used that wealth for the benefit of others as well as myself.

We know that there are criminals within the Church as there are within every large, and sometimes small organizations. But we don't demand that everyone bail out when these criminals are discovered, we ask that THEY be removed, from our Governments, from our Churches etc. And when they are not (see Dick Cheney/Bush, Wall Street Criminals etc) it doesn't mean we should give up. We keep trying to make it a better country. Same goes for people who belong to any other organization that has the power to do good.